Ross Paterson set his sights on the future after skippering Scotland to bronze at the European Curling Championships in Helsingborg.
Paterson’s rink emerged victorious over Mikkel Krause’s Danish outfit 7-2, claiming decisive scores of three in both the sixth and eighth ends.
Until that stage the contest had been a tense one, with only three scores in it up until the fifth end as Denmark took a narrow lead when Krause placed one of his own stones onto the button to score one.
Despite disappointment at missing out on the showpiece final, and a chance to retain Scotland’s crown, Paterson exclaimed pride at his side’s showing and had one eye on targeting bigger successes.
“Our objective was to come here and win, but over the course of the week we came up against some very good opposition and when you lose a semi-final all you can do is pick yourselves up and aim to get that medal,” Paterson said.
“It was important for us. It was our first medal as a team and my first as skip and it was a nice way to finish the week.
“As a new team we have shown that we can compete against the best in the world.
“Our goals are set high for the future and we prepared as best we could and in the vast majority of games we prepared very well, but at times we got punished for small mistakes.
“We were a bit unlucky at times, but we got lucky to qualify for the play-offs and we’re happy with where we’re at and what we’ve achieved.
“Overall I’m very proud of what the team has achieved this week. We’re happy to get a medal at our first championships together, but we see this very much as a stepping stone onto bigger and better things.”
Scotland are guaranteed two medals after Team Muirhead booked their place in Saturday’s women’s final, where they will face Sweden after beating Switzerland 3-2.
It was a tight affair that was locked at 1-1 until the eighth end when Scotland stole a score but the Swiss forced an extra-end with one point in the tenth.
However, Eve Muirhead held her nerve at the death to book her rink’s place in the final showdown. Photo credit: World Curling Federation
Sportsbeat 2019